Judge Sentences Insurrectionist & Blames GOP For Spreading Lies

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Indiana resident Anna Morgan-Lloyd has now become the first Capitol riot participant to receive a sentence for their actions, and on the occasion of handing down the consequences that she’d face, federal Judge Royce Lamberth rebuked the spreading Republican idea that what happened at the Capitol on January 6 wasn’t such a big deal. At one point, Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.) — who, like so many other members of Congress, was actually at the Capitol that day — ignorantly compared elements of the riot to a “normal tourist visit.” Lamberth doesn’t “know what planet they were on,” as he put it, referring to those who’ve downplayed the attack.

The judge commented as follows:

‘I’m especially troubled by the accounts of some members of Congress that January 6 was just a day of tourists walking through the Capitol. I don’t know what planet they were on, but there are millions of people in this country that saw what happened.’

Part of “what happened” is that rioting Trump supporters stormed through the Capitol under the pretense of lies about the integrity of last year’s presidential election that were spread by public figures including prominent Republican members of Congress. The reality of the riot that Lamberth pointed to includes that fact. Morgan-Lloyd — who pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor and was not accused of more serious crimes like conspiracy and assaulting law enforcement officers — has now been sentenced to three years of probation and 120 hours of community service. Meanwhile, Clyde has not been the only Republican leader to issue similarly appalling statements. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.) has claimed that there “was no violence on the Senate side, in terms of the chamber,” which is simply not correct.

At another point, Johnson claimed in reference to individuals who stormed the Capitol building that day that they “weren’t rioting,” adding that it “doesn’t look like an armed insurrection when you have people that breach the Capitol, and I don’t condone it, but they’re staying within the roped lines in the Rotunda.” No matter the fact that certain individuals happened to walk through roped passageways in the Capitol Rotunda, characterizing that as where any meaningfully sized group of individuals “stayed” is just ridiculously deceptive. Johnson’s comments brazenly ignore the fact that on the same grounds, rioters climbed up walls, broke windows and then made their way through the shattered glass, entered Congressional chambers, and more.